


tired of this human duet

by ftmsteverogers



Series: Identity Porn [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Canon Divergence - Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Identity Porn, M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, kinky undertones, steve isn't a dom but he isn't Not a dom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:27:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25944331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ftmsteverogers/pseuds/ftmsteverogers
Summary: In which the Winter Soldier is sent by HYDRA to seduce and distract Captain America instead of killing him outright.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: Identity Porn [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1897276
Comments: 112
Kudos: 557





	1. no civilizing hides

**Author's Note:**

> Content warnings are in the end notes. Title is from 'Animal Impulses' by IAMX.

The suit they gave him was not properly tailored to his body. It was loose at the bicep, the waist, its previous owner clearly a good fifteen to twenty pounds heavier than its current occupant. This was not entirely unexpected, however, as the man looking back at him in the mirror had been cut down by the past sixty-eight years as if by a razor, giving him the uneasy air of a starving wolf. 

Metal hand rose to touch stubbled cheek. He smiled, baring teeth at the mirror. The photograph taped to the corner caught its subject mid-laugh, turning to look at someone else just out of frame. The Winter Soldier frowned, then tried the smile again, giving it his best approximation. His handlers had been very clear — his whole performance hinged on that smile.

One more try, turning his head just right to look at whatever the man in the photograph was looking at. Eyes crinkling at the corners, one cheek dimpling, flash of pearly, slightly crooked teeth. 

Close enough. It would have to do.

He buttoned his jacket closed slowly, metal fingers clicking against the buttons. With the suit complete and in place, he barely recognized himself. But then, that was not particularly difficult to achieve. He picked up the thin black glove from the edge of the sink, sliding it neatly onto his left hand, obscuring the writhing shift of metal plates across the backs of his knuckles. Now he was more than unrecognizable — he was human.

The Winter Soldier peeled the photograph off the mirror and put it in his breast pocket, in case he needed it for reference later. It was not easy for him to soften his face, to melt the candle of his wariness until he could appear just as warm and fond as the man in the image; he had spent the vast majority of his time in recent memory doing exactly the opposite, sharpening, his mind steel on HYDRA’s whetstone. The pretty scabbard he folded himself into now would not make him any less a blade.

The Soldier combed Brylcreem through his recently-cut hair, slicking it back, and did not allow himself to remember the smell.

* * *

The neighborhood was popular, which the Soldier did not find promising. His target’s apartment sat on the corner junction of two busy streets, big windows on each side pointing down at the pavement below. The Soldier jogged up the front steps, hands deep inside jacket pockets to wrap fingers around the switchblade handle, to fiddle with the tin of poison capsules. 

The late afternoon sun shone down with a brazen eye, and he found that he did not care for this daylight, this exposure. His missions were typically done best under cover of dark, or at least under cover. He was a sniper, and he was not comfortable anywhere he did not have a good vantage point. The sun shone down. The Soldier watched his own feet ascend the steps, polished leather gleaming. The boots, at least, fit right. 

The door code had been provided to him by his handlers, and once inside, he breathed easier. He passed a woman on the stairs who carried a small dog under one arm, and he smiled at her, the practiced smile that still sat unnaturally on his face. A rumble of a growl vibrated at the back of the dog’s throat, and the woman’s answering smile turned very apologetic. She shushed the dog, hurrying away down the stairs. The Soldier tracked her retreat with his eyes. 

Under other circumstances, he might have killed her for the delay. There would be a soft spot just beneath her jaw, where his metal thumb could apply enough pressure to crush her throat before she could scream. He had done it before. It would be easy.

His hand used to tremble slightly, just before it tightened. But this had been many years ago, and his handlers assured the higher-ups that this defect had been overcome by the mid-seventies. The Winter Soldier wouldn’t know. He hadn’t had to test it in a long time.

As he walked down the hall, the Soldier adjusted his posture. He loosened his stride at the hip, giving himself a slight sway in his step, a hint of a swagger. He relaxed at the shoulder, the elbow, making his gestures more fluid. The smile, the damned smile, rested lightly on his lips, ready to be drawn like a blade across his mouth. Room 315, at the hallway’s junction with the far wall. Corner apartment. Home to Captain Steven Rogers, O-462362. 

With adrenaline humming just beneath his skin, the Winter Soldier knocked.

“One second,” came a muffled voice from behind the door, the sound of sock feet on hardwood floor. The Soldier put his left hand in his pocket and cocked his hip to the side, whole body poised at the ready as he listened to the lock turn, the creak of door hinges.

Captain Rogers appeared from behind the door just as he did in the photographs HYDRA had shown the Winter Soldier: he was tall, blond, well-muscled and broad across his shoulders, eyes impossibly blue and hands the perfect shape for making fists. His mouth parted as if to speak, but no noise came out — the living color drained from his face, leaving him pale as the dead.

“Heya, Steve,” the Soldier said, leaning on the Brooklyn accent he’d spent a week perfecting. “You gonna let me in, or do I have’ta do our secret knock?”

“Bucky?” Rogers asked, voice breaking. 

The Soldier took his hands out of his pockets, and the practiced smile bloomed across his face, although he did not know how to make it touch his eyes. “Y’know, when I imagined our reunion, there was more hugging,” he remarked, cocking a brow.

Rogers was on him before the Soldier could blink. Rogers threw his arms around him, squeezing so hard it took herculean effort not to tense up or push him off. The Soldier exhaled through his teeth, his own arms rising to encircle Rogers’ waist and hold him close enough to hear Rogers’ shaky breaths in his ear. He was very warm and his whole body was hard with muscle. The Soldier felt fear touch him with an icy hand, fear of this powerful body and what it could do, how difficult it would be to overpower him.

“You died,” Rogers said thickly, shoulders trembling. “You died, I watched you die.”

“It didn’t take,” the Soldier said. He put a hand to the small of Rogers’ back, thumb stroking cautious circles. “You really wanna do this in the doorway, pal? Let your neighbors get a good eyeful?”

“Fuck,” Rogers said, with feeling. “Christ. Okay.” He tugged the Soldier inside the threshold and kicked the door closed. The click of the lock after sent a flicker of dread down the Soldier’s spine.

Rogers had yet to stop touching him. He put his hands on the Soldier’s shoulders, his hair, the flutter-sharp pulse just beneath his jaw, fingertips alighting only briefly before landing somewhere else. The Soldier let him. Ice-blue eyes tracked the movement of Rogers’ hands, trying to decide what to do next, what to say. His handlers had emphasized that this would be the most difficult part of the operation, although Rogers’ desire to believe would give him a strong advantage. 

“How are you here, Buck?” Rogers asked, desperation seeping into his voice like blood through a shirt. “You fell a thousand feet.”

“Twelve hundred, actually.” The Soldier’s mouth twisted. He stepped deeper inside the apartment, unbuttoning his jacket as he did so, and glanced around for a hook to hang his coat on. He could hear a hiss of wind very faintly, a threat of winter in his ears, roused by sense memory of falling. He had been hurt in a myriad of ways, in HYDRA’s training. The reminder of specifics was not alarming or unexpected.

Rogers, however, let out an audible breath. The Soldier turned back to look at him, coat now neatly hung in the hall, and watched Rogers breathe hard where he was rooted at the door. 

“One thousand two hundred feet,” Rogers repeated, hoarse.

The Soldier held his gaze. “Give or take.”

Rogers’ eyes flicked toward the hall closet, where the Soldier could see the glint of red and blue that meant his shield. “Gonna need more of an explanation than that,” Rogers said, steel creeping into his voice. The hair on the back of the Soldier’s neck rose.

“It’s not a pretty story.” The Soldier set his jaw. “You sure you wanna hear it?”

“Bucky,” Rogers said roughly.

“HYDRA found me in the snow,” the Soldier explained. He kept his mouth soft around the words, hands open and guileless where they rested at his sides. “Put me on ice. I hear you know a thing or two about that.”

Rogers’ lips parted with shock.

“Fell into the Soviets’ hands after the war,” the Soldier added, allowing his voice to crack. “Got passed around like a prize.” He felt his lower lip tremble on cue, big doe eyes watering as he clenched his right fist at his side hard enough for his fingernails to bite into the meat of his palm. It was difficult to fake this kind of emotion — the shock of pain made it easier to make his face do what he wanted, eyelashes damp against his cheek when he blinked.

Rogers staggered forward a step, then another, until he was standing right in front of the Soldier once more. His shaking hand reached up to touch the Soldier’s face again, wiping the wet tear-track from the Soldier's cheek. “How’d you make it back to me?” he asked, helpless.

“SHIELD,” the Soldier said. He leaned into Rogers’ palm. “Found me. Told ‘em to let me tell you myself, soon as I heard you were alive too. Knew you wouldn’t believe it ‘till you saw me.”

“Fuck,” Rogers said.

“I know,” the Soldier said, and laughed, bemused. “Who’d’a thought, huh? Both of us makin’ it this far.”

Rogers put their foreheads together, squeezing his eyes closed. They stood like that for a very long moment, the Winter Soldier and Captain America, Rogers clinging to him.

“I’ve been tricked before,” Rogers rasped. The raw wanting in his eyes did not ease when he opened them again, but the open hunger was tinged with wariness. “Tell me I’m not being tricked now.”

“It’s me,” the Soldier said. He put his hand to Rogers’ hip, his side, and squeezed. “Don’t you know me when you see me?”

Rogers crushed the Soldier close, hand cupping the back of his head, and he did not say anything at all. But the Soldier knew he had won, because Rogers was allowing the Soldier’s dangerous hands all over his unprotected back — his metal palm lay just above the soft space between ribs through which he could slide a knife as easy as cutting butter.

“Thank God,” Rogers whispered. “Oh, Christ, Buck, I really... I really thought you were gone this time.”

“Didn’t I always promise to come back to you?” the Soldier murmured back, just as quiet. He stayed still for Rogers’ holding, letting himself get rocked back and forth a little as they stood. “Didn’t you believe me?”

Rogers gave a choking sob and squeezed even tighter. Over his shoulder, the Winter Soldier looked at the window in front of himself, eyes gone dead now that no one was observing them.

* * *

Rogers set him up in the guest bedroom, so the Winter Soldier assembled his base while Rogers arranged supper. He retrieved all his weaponry from different pockets, hiding them in convenient locations all throughout the room; a knife taped beneath the nightstand; a gun in the dresser drawer beneath the linens; poison capsules in the pocket of the pants he folded neatly, once he’d undressed. He would need these weapons eventually, but for now, it was most important that he maintain his cover.

The Soldier was not comfortable without a weapon in his hand. He lay on the bed with his knees bent and legs dangling over the end, eyes on the ceiling, breaths deep and even as he listened to the sound of Rogers puttering about the kitchen. It was a rhythmic sound, regular. The Soldier began to predict when a footfall would make the floorboards creak.

Then, footsteps coming down the hall, and the Soldier had to allow his stiff body to sink into the mattress a little and his eyes to drift shut. The rap of knuckles against the door frame did not make him jump.

“Should get some food in you before you sleep,” Rogers said apologetically. “Come have dinner.”

It was only five p.m. — an early meal indeed. But the Soldier just nodded and stretched, jaw popping with a yawn, and sat up. “Still actin’ like you think you’re my Ma or something,” he tried to tease.

Rogers shot him a strange look. “You’re one to talk, pal.”

The Soldier blinked at him, face frozen, and then made himself laugh. “S’pose I shouldn’t be a hypocrite,” he said warmly, trying to fix whatever he’d said wrong. “I just remember how you were when I first got my orders.” He thought of the dossier he’d been given _(Rogers and Barnes were inseparable on both schoolyard and battlefield)_ and the knowledge that Barnes had been drafted. The spark of confusion in Steve’s eyes flickered out as he ducked his head and smiled.

“Okay, wise guy,” he said, and patted the door frame twice. “I’ve got grilled cheese and tomato soup waiting on you.”

Rogers retreated to the kitchen and the Soldier absently stroked a hand across the edge of the bed, over and over until he’d traced a deep wrinkle into the bedspread’s fabric.

He ended up waiting three and a half minutes to join Rogers in the kitchen, so by the time he did, Rogers already had place settings and cups of water on the table. The Soldier spilled himself into a chair in an easy sprawl, whole body projecting ease, and waited to be spoken to again. He didn’t have to wait long.

“I want to call my friend Natasha,” Rogers said, carrying two bowls to the table, then going back for the sandwiches. “To get some more information about what you went through. I work with SHIELD on a day to day basis, it’s weird that this is the first I’m hearing about it.” A pinched expression appeared on his face, then, mouth twisting. “Although I’m not _really_ surprised they kept it from me. They keep their cards very close to vest, this organization.”

The Soldier knew this, as well as he knew that Romanoff was dangerous, and he would have to play his own cards very well indeed in order to get around her. He wasn’t sure he could manage it without tipping his hand.

“D’you think you can give it a bit?” he asked, voice soft and a little sad, and timed it with a rubbed-temple gesture to suggest he had a headache. “We definitely gotta get to the bottom of everything, but I’m so tired.” He gave Rogers a small, pathetic smile. 

Rogers’ face went awash with understanding, and the Soldier tried not to let it disgust him, but failed. 

“I’ll talk to her tomorrow, how’s that?” Rogers said gently, and nudged the Soldier’s foot under the table with his own. “We’ll get some rest first, and another meal or two in ya.”

“Now you’re doing it on purpose,” the Soldier said, rolling his eyes. Rogers laughed, and when the Soldier joined him, it almost managed to sound real.

* * *

The Soldier lay in bed, but he did not sleep. The digital clock on the top of the dresser across the room from him read 12:32. With the window cracked, the sounds of traffic from the street below had free reign to seep into the room like a stain. This was along with the warmth still lingering from the day, barely cool under the cover of dark. The Soldier had stripped down to shorts and undershirt, and he caught himself enjoying the breeze as he watched the shadows creep across the ceiling and waited to make his next move.

Weapons most likely were not meant to have a metric by which to gauge the plesantness of an evening. However, the Soldier had long ago stopped volunteering information his handlers did not specifically request, and as such, he retained the ability. It was a pleasant night. The feeling of warm air gently blown against bare skin made gooseflesh break out down the back of his right arm.

At 12:50, the Soldier rose from the guest room bed and silently stalked down the hall toward Rogers’ bedroom. His handler’s words echoed around in his mind _(Take Rogers to bed if you have to, Soldier)_ and although Rogers was already very much in bed, the Soldier could feel the precarious edge of his current position. If he wanted to cement it properly before Romanoff arrived, he needed to raise the stakes.

 _Pure speculation, if Rogers and Barnes had been in a sexual relationship,_ they’d told him. _Tread carefully, Soldier._

That must have been a joke. The tactical boots they routinely gave the Winter Soldier were not built for light treading, and nor were the feet inside.

“Steve?” the Soldier murmured, rapping knuckles against the door frame.

There was an audible rustle of blankets behind the door, soft sounds of foot to carpet. The door opened, and judging by Rogers’ rumpled state, he’d been asleep or close to it.

“You okay?” Rogers asked, voice soft and raspy until he saw the Soldier’s left arm and his eyes widened comically, jaw dropping. “Buck — your arm —"

“Lost it when I fell,” the Soldier said, trying to cut him off. “It’s fine.”

But Rogers was already reaching for it, and the Soldier had to bite back a grimace as Rogers grabbed it, weighing the elbow in a cupped palm, back of metal hand cradled in the other. 

“Hell,” Rogers breathed. “Does it hurt?”

_They chopped off the stump of what little arm was left above the elbow without anesthetic, not to be cruel, but because they did not have much time. They bolted the metal straight to the bone, and through the next several weeks, the Soldier could feel ragged nerves refiring randomly as they connected to a complicated network of wires — and foreign titanium fingertips twitched in response —  
_

“Not really,” the Soldier answered. He twisted his left arm one way and then the other, making the plates recalibrate with a quiet, uneasy shiver. The servos in his elbow whirred softly. “It’s just an arm.”

Rogers looked at him, gazing into his eyes, and the Soldier peeked back at him through his eyelashes, trying to look non-threatening.

“I knocked on your door because I can’t sleep,” the Soldier told Rogers in an attempt to yank the conversation back to more common ground. “And I haven’t seen you in a hundred years, so it seemed silly to keep my distance.”

Rogers had yet to let go of his arm. “Sixty-eight years,” he murmured. “Technically.” 

The Soldier turned his wrist just slightly, so he could wrap his fingers around the jut of Rogers’ elbow. “Technically,” he agreed. “Can I stay with you?” He took a shuffled half-step forward into Rogers’ space. “It’ll be like old times.”

Rogers’ eyes were unreadable, but he drew back willingly enough, holding the door open for the Soldier so that the light from the hallway and the shadows they both cast tumbled into the room before them. The Soldier knew without really looking that his shadow was darker, seeping inky-black into the carpet.

“Right or left side?” Rogers asked, nodding toward the bed.

“Right,” the Soldier answered, because then Rogers would be able to hear him better.

He paused. Where did that thought come from? In no document he’d been given had there been any detail about Captain Rogers’ hearing; as far as he was aware, Rogers was in peak physical condition in every aspect of his terrifying body. 

Rogers, oblivious to the record scratching in the Soldier’s head, turned out the hallway light and walked over to the bed to fluff both pillows, rearranging sheets and blankets. The Soldier eased himself onto the mattress on his back, careful to keep the other man in his periphery at all times. Rogers followed suit. It was strange to see this body of his, which had been created for war — a weapon, just as the Soldier’s had been — lying peacefully on his stomach between soft grey sheets, head pillowed on his arms.

“Feel like I’m gonna wake up any second,” Rogers whispered, looking at him. 

The Soldier huffed a dutiful laugh and reached across the distance, thumb ghosting over the curve of Rogers’ cheekbone. “I’m real, pal.”

The smile that broke over Rogers’ face was difficult to watch. The Soldier looked away, his own face turning to the darkness.

He didn’t anticipate the hand sliding across his bicep, and jolted, grasping for a knife at his side that was not there — but the sudden threat was only Rogers, looking abashed, arm hanging in the air between them like a held breath.

“Sorry,” Rogers said.

The Soldier didn’t say anything in response, he just rolled onto his side and nudged Rogers until he did the same, wrapping his left arm around that surprisingly tiny waist and holding him close to his chest. This way, there would be no more surprises.

“Lotta shit has happened since I saw you last,” he mumbled into the space between Rogers’ shoulder blades. “Startle easy, I guess.”

Rogers nodded. The Soldier felt it more than he saw it.

“Since when are you the big spoon?” Rogers muttered after a long moment, laying his hand over the Soldier’s forearm to hang on.

The Soldier rubbed his cheek against Rogers’ spine and said nothing, since Rogers’ comment did not seem to be a complaint. Whatever reply Rogers had anticipated was lost between one breath and the next, the syrupy darkness in the room cocooning both men in a drugging kind of silence, and before the Soldier could brace himself for whatever was coming next, sleep took him.

* * *

In the morning, Rogers carried on with the day like waking up next to his dead best friend was normal. As far as the Soldier knew, perhaps it was. It certainly lent more credence to his handlers’ theory that Rogers and Barnes had been romantically intertwined, in any case.

Rogers made breakfast, he set the table. The Soldier laughed along to his anecdotes and repeated details back to him, some that were fed to him through HYDRA, some that Rogers had mentioned earlier: a trip to Coney Island, _remember that awful sunburn? Your face turned into one big freckle;_ the old apartment with it’s terrible plumbing; a stray cat that Barnes had kept feeding even though it nearly scratched his eye out and made Rogers sneeze; the quiet zipping together of their bedrolls on the war front that their teammates had tactfully declined to mention, out of respect or obliviousness or a conscious decision to ignore it.

“Well, it was cold,” Rogers said as he flipped eggs, ears turning red. “I’d forgotten all about that, actually.”

Had he? The Soldier tapped fingertips against his jaw, wondering where he’d pulled that story from. A lucky guess, perhaps. 

“Wasn’t _that_ cold,” the Soldier replied, leaning into his hunch, eyes half lidded when Rogers glanced over his shoulder at him. The Soldier smirked.

The rest of Rogers’ face joined his ears in hue, and he turned back to the stove in a hurry. This was an interesting reaction. The Soldier rose from the table and stepped up behind the other man, putting a hand to the small of his back while his cheek found his shoulder. Rogers froze the hell up, so the Soldier rubbed his back a little, sighing.

“Missed you,” he murmured into the soft cotton of Rogers’ t-shirt. Rogers made a choked-up sound and put his hand on the crown of the Soldier’s head to keep him there. “You’re burning the eggs, Stevie.”

“Shit,” Steve yelped, and jumped to save them.

Once they were both seated again — the eggs mostly salvaged — Rogers fiddled with his fork and shifted in his seat, casting his gaze across the table at the Soldier.

“I called Nat,” he said. His shoulders were squared, like he was bracing for an argument, and the Soldier did his best to look mild beneath the drum-beat panic that rose up in him. “She’s coming over before lunch. I know you said you were tired, but —”

“It’s okay, Steve.” The Soldier smiled. “I wanna meet her.”

Rogers' answering smile was very relieved. “I really think she’ll help,” he told him, and finally began to eat his breakfast. “She’s great. You’ll love her.”

 _She’ll eat me alive,_ the Soldier thought, and speared a bite of egg on his fork.


	2. our animal impulses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha throws a shadow of suspicion. The Soldier takes drastic measures. Steve lets the light in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings in the end notes, as always.

Agent Natasha Romanoff brought a box of cupcakes and a carefully mild expression to Steve’s apartment, the former of which unnerved the Soldier, and the latter he instantly distrusted. Rogers hugged her as soon as she crossed the threshold, bending down to do it, and she met the Soldier’s eyes over his shoulder with an assessing gaze that made a shiver of ice slither down his spine. He smiled winningly. She did not smile back.

“So why don’t you introduce me to your friend, here,” she said, once Rogers drew back with a final squeeze to her upper arm. It was only once Rogers was looking at her that her face relaxed. “Or you could keep crushing me, that works too.”

“Aw, Nat,” Rogers said, grinning. “You like it, c’mon.”

Romanoff quirked an eyebrow, her smile veering toward indulgence.

“This is Sergeant James Barnes,” Rogers said, putting an arm around the Soldier to draw him forward into the direct line of Romanoff’s stare. “My best friend.”

The Soldier effectively stamped down the frisson of fear that threatened to stop him dead in his tracks.

“Everyone I like calls me Bucky,” he said, and stuck out his hand - his right hand - for her to shake. “Pleased to meetcha.”

Romanoff shook his hand. She had a firm grip, and as the Soldier studied her arm, he calculated that there were at least six ways she could possibly attempt to take him down with just such a hold. He could see it in his mind’s eye, the slam of compact fist to solar plexus, yanking his extended arm to propel him forward into the sharp collision of her knee.

“I heard you were dead,” Romanoff said pleasantly, taking her hand back.

The Soldier took back his own, flexing it a couple times before he put it back at his side. “Don’t believe everything you hear,” he replied, and gave a magnanimous shrug, as if to say _who’d’a thought it, huh?_ “I’m breathing, ain’t I?”

Rogers’ eyes kept bouncing back and forth between them, his excitement slowly deflating into something that the Soldier wasn’t sure was disappointment or confusion. Possibly both. The nuances of other people’s emotions were not easy for him to guess, despite his training. 

“You certainly seem to be,” she agreed. “Coffee, Steve? It’s been an interesting morning, and that was before I met your old war buddy.”

“Oh,” Rogers said, and blinked, like he’d just remembered his manners. “Right, yeah, of course.” He nodded the pair of them toward the kitchen, where he busied himself setting up the coffee pot, gathering mugs.

“You haven’t aged a day,” Romanoff said as she perched on one of the kitchen chairs.

The Soldier sat in the other. “Cryostasis. It was -”

“HYDRA,” Romanoff finished. “Yes, I know.”

The Soldier watched her carefully. What else did she know?

“Do you remember Odessa?” she asked.

Rogers’ back stiffened in the Soldier’s periphery. “Nat -”

“It’s alright, pal,” the Soldier said, and leaned back in his chair, waving a hand. “Let her finish.”

Romanoff blinked slowly, and then leaned back in her seat as well, hiking her shirt up to expose her lower belly. A scar splintered out in a star just above her right hip, an ugly knotted thing not at all dissimilar from the jagged teeth of tissue that bit all the way around the Soldier’s left shoulder socket. 

“It’s been a long time since I saw you last,” Romanoff said. “But I’d know you anywhere. Do you remember this? You shot a target straight through me.”

Wind howled in the Soldier’s ears. He did not remember. “What are you talkin’ about, huh? I may be a helluva shot, but that’s inhuman,” he replied firmly. “You got me mixed up with the wrong guy, ma’am. I’ve never even been to Odessa.”

“No? Steve said the Russians had you for a while.” She tugged her shirt back down again, smoothing out the wrinkles. “Ukraine isn’t far from Russia.”

A sudden sun-burst of memory bloomed behind his eyes, a young woman no older than twenty-five putting her body between him and his target - he remembered her head on fire, but that was - her hair, possibly -

“Lady, you got the wrong guy,” he repeated, exerting conscious force not to give a jerk of his head to shake the memory off. “I was a prisoner of war, not a fuckin’ secret agent.”

Romanoff regarded him silently for a long moment. The Soldier was aware, now that the moment of tension had reached its peak, that Rogers had turned around at the counter at some point and was staring at him with open horror. _Get a fucking poker face,_ the Soldier thought, and then felt uncomfortable. It was in his best interest for Rogers’ emotions to be clear and easy to understand at first glance. He didn’t understand his twinge of unease at the sight.

“In that case,” Romanoff said, smiling. She reached for the box of cupcakes and sliced the sticker on the lid open with her fingernail. “It’s good to meet you, Bucky.”

She opened the box like a peace offering, so the Soldier huffed a breath and rolled his eyes like he was supposed to, reaching in to take one. “Jeez,” he said, and peeled the wrapper down. “Are all dames this suspicious in this century?”

“Don’t say dame, Buck,” Rogers corrected. “It’s out of fashion now.”

Romanoff’s smirk was unreadable, as were her eyes. “We’re always telling Steve about what’s in fashion these days,” she said. “Catching him up to 2014 one internet meme at a time.”

“He wasn’t any more en vogue in 1945, you might be fighting a losing battle,” the Soldier said, which made Rogers make a deeply aggrieved noise, Romanoff’s smile widening.

* * *

The Soldier didn’t quite put his ear to the door when Rogers walked Romanoff out again, but he stood near enough to listen, trusting his enhanced hearing to close the distance.

“What was all that about Odessa?” Rogers demanded, the hurt in his voice obvious even without seeing his face. “That’s _Bucky,_ Nat, after everything I’ve told you about him, I thought you of all people would -”

“Let you barrel headfirst into a trap?” Romanoff interrupted gently. There was a soft sound, hand to fabric. The Soldier pictured her fixing Rogers’ crooked shirt collar and tasted bile faintly on the back of his tongue. “Whoever the man in your apartment is, he isn’t what you want. You asked me to search SHIELD to corroborate his story. It came back clean.”

Someone scuffed their foot against the floor. “Then what’s your issue?” Rogers asked.

“It came back too clean. Every detail ready, waiting to be found,” she said. 

“Maybe because he’s telling the truth. I know that’d be new with the company you keep, but...”

“Steve.”

“...Sorry.”

“Do you trust me?” A beat of silence. _“Steve.”_

“You can’t ask me to trust you more than I trust him,” Steve bit out. “You just can’t, Natasha. You know what he is to me.”

“I remember the face of the man who put me in the hospital for a month,” Romanoff countered.

The Soldier wanted to draw back at that, wanted to disappear into the apartment and not hear another word. The grainy, cloying taste of cupcake frosting lingered in his mouth. He wanted to brush his teeth with the toothbrush Steve had given him until his gums bled.

The mission. He needed to focus.

“...careful,” Romanoff was saying. “Okay? Can you do that for me?”

“Yes,” Steve said.

“Thank you.” A smack of a kiss, too dry to be on the lips. “Keep me updated. Don’t let him out of your sight for too long.”

“Well, that wasn’t going to happen anyway,” Steve said wryly. Romanoff laughed at that, and for the first time, the Soldier thought it was probably a real one.

Steve would be coming in soon. The Soldier slipped back into the kitchen and arranged himself at the table once more, mismatched hands around his coffee cup. The door opened, Steve shutting it quietly behind himself, the two locks clicking into place. He rejoined the Soldier and heaved a deep sigh.

“Sorry, Buck,” he said. “That didn’t go like I’d hoped.”

“Does it ever, with you and women?” the Soldier asked, smiling crookedly.

Steve shot him a glare. But he also looked relieved. “Oh, shut it,” he said.

The Soldier just raised his eyebrows and took a long drink of now-lukewarm coffee. He didn’t realize that he’d stopped calling the man Rogers.

* * *

The Soldier watched Steve like a hawk the rest of the day, trying to tell if Steve trusted Romanoff’s intel. Although there was some lingering tension in his shoulders, Steve kept smiling at him, kept touching him every now and then - hand to shoulder as he passed, nudge of foot beneath table - and the Soldier did not think he would do this if he was truly convinced that the Soldier was the imposter Romanoff believed he was.

She was right, of course. The Soldier worried the inside of his cheek between his teeth and watched Steve move about his day, kept him company, allowed him to dress the Soldier up in his spare clothes so he could run errands with him without standing out. The Soldier was swallowed up by an old sweatshirt that smelled faintly of Steve’s cologne. He spent a long moment in the grocery store with his face tucked into the hood while Steve paid, just smelling it. 

“I’m gonna grab a smoke, meetcha at the car?” he said, nudging Steve with his elbow while Steve put things on the conveyor belt. 

“Don’t take too long,” Steve said, smiling as he nudged him back. 

The Soldier showed his teeth in his dutiful grin, catching an amused look from the cashier out of the corner of his eye. On impulse, he rocked up onto the balls of his feet and kissed Steve’s cheek, rolling back onto his heels after. Steve’s face was blank with shock, jaw slack, hand paused in the middle of removing cash from his wallet. The Soldier shrugged, shot him a wink, and disappeared through the automatic doors again, relying on snap judgements to dictate how he reacted.

As long as he kept him off balance, the Soldier was fairly certain he could continue to distract Steve as the mission dictated. The way his heart raced as he shook a cigarette out of its box was inexcusable, though, and he narrowed his eyes at his hands to make sure they remained steady.

He struck a match well enough, shaking it out with a thoughtful snap of his wrist. His training was, at least, good for this.

While he was outside and away from Steve’s prying eyes, the Soldier checked his communicator for further instructions. The last three missives were the same as they’d been since his release from base:

  * Gain entrance to Captain Rogers’ home.
  * Earn his trust by whatever means necessary.
  * Maintain a holding pattern and distract him until given further orders.



With no further orders, the Soldier had to assume that his job was still to continue to hold his attention. He leaned against Steve’s car and took a long drag from his cigarette, waiting for Steve to return with his grocery bags. He could see the shape of him inside the store through the glass doors, the curve of his arm and a vague impression of a smile when he turned his head just enough for the Soldier to see the corner of his mouth.

The smoke on the Soldier’s tongue tasted wrong. He made a face and dropped the cigarette to the sidewalk, stamping it out with his heel.

“You miss your lucky strikes, huh?” Steve asked. The Soldier glanced up, catching Steve’s pointed look toward the crushed cigarette. “Always were picky.”

“Damn right,” the Soldier told him. “Got used to having the best.” He timed this with a look that dragged up Steve’s body, landing on his eyes last. 

Steve opened his mouth, closed it again, then shook his head briskly. “I can see _you’re_ in a mood,” he said, walking around the Soldier to the trunk. “What’s with these lines of yours, Buck? Been saving ‘em up?”

“You complaining?” the Soldier drawled.

Steve shot him a look, arranging the three bags in the trunk so they wouldn’t fall over in transit. He was flustered, either by the teasing or the warm weight of the Soldier’s eyes on him; it was stark and obvious in the pink that crept up from underneath his shirt collar.

“Let’s go home,” Steve said. The trunk slammed closed with a satisfying sound. “Unless you wanna lean on the car looking moody some more.”

The Soldier pushed off the car and opened the passenger door. “Nah, I got my quota in.”

The drive back to the apartment was uneventful. The Soldier looked out the window and watched the city pass in a blur, watched the sun sink down toward evening, watched Steve’s reflection in the glass. Steve kept sliding little sideways glances over the center console, expression somewhere between suspicion and awe.

The Soldier could work with this. Neither of those emotions was an outright no.

He helped carry the bags inside, navigating the hallway and the kitchen while trying to keep his posture as loose and easy as Bucky Barnes was meant to be. This was more difficult than he expected, because having Steve at his back where he couldn’t see him made every muscle of his body want to tense up.

“I was thinking pasta for dinner,” Steve said, punctuated by dull metallic sounds as he arranged cans on their shelves. “Unless you wanna do something more elaborate.”

“Pasta’s good,” the Soldier said agreeably, waiting until Steve was occupied with the breadbox to come up behind him and wrap his arms around his waist, sliding both hands up his front. “Little early, though, no?”

Steve froze from head to toe. “Buck,” he said.

“What?” the Soldier asked, nuzzling into his nape. Steve was slightly taller than him, so his cheek rasped against the t-shirt collar. “It’s five.”

Steve’s hands released their death grip on the kitchen counter so he could lay them over the Soldier’s, stilling them. “What’re you doing, pal.”

“Thought it was obvious.” He kissed the soft skin beneath his cheek, where downy blond hair dotted down the back of Steve’s neck. “Is it not obvious?”

Steve exhaled like it hurt, but he didn’t say anything else for a long moment. The Soldier took the opportunity to lay a string of strategic kisses from Steve’s hairline to his shoulder blade, his own dark hair escaping in wisps to brush against him as he went. Steve shivered. The Soldier squeezed Steve’s hip, tucking fingertips up beneath the hem of his shirt, chasing the way he could feel Steve’s stomach muscles clench.

“Moving kinda fast,” Steve managed. “Don’t you think?”

“Been sixty-eight years,” the Soldier murmured into his ear. Then he nipped the lobe of it, smirking on purpose with his lips to Steve’s skin so the other man could feel them quirk upward. “That too fast for you, old man?”

Steve made a garbled sound that might have been an attempt at a laugh. “I’ve never been any good at seeing this coming, you know that.”

“Let me, sweetheart.” The Soldier licked the little divot where Steve’s jaw met his skull and tried to skip over talking about what he knew and what he didn’t. “Lemme take care of you. Do you want me to?”

“Christ,” Steve spit.

The Soldier slid his hand the rest of the way up Steve’s shirt. His skin was warm and smooth, unbothered by scars, and he trembled just barely beneath the Soldier’s questing fingertips. “C’mon,” the Soldier coaxed, using the softest voice he knew how to use. It felt strange and foreign in his mouth, but it must have worked, because Steve twisted around in his arms enough that they were eye to eye.

“You just teasing me?” Steve asked breathlessly. “Or do you mean it?”

Caught off guard, the Soldier studied Steve’s eyes in search of the right answer. He’d thought this step wouldn’t come as a surprise to him - he’d thought it would be desired, would be simple. He swallowed hard, nodding sharply.

“Hey,” Steve said, gentler. He reached out and touched the Soldier’s cheek, smoothing back the errant curls from his face. “You scared? That why you’re acting weird?”

The Soldier decided to take the line Steve was throwing him and nodded again, arranging his features to one of slightly more trepidation. Steve’s smile turned very understanding as he cradled the Soldier’s face between both hands. This gesture was meant to be tender, most likely, but it made the Soldier think of strangulation, of snapping necks.

“I dunno how to do this,” the Soldier muttered truthfully. “You gotta gimme a hand, Steve.”

“Just a hand?” Steve’s eyes glinted. “Pal, we’ve never talked about this once. Seems a helluva time to try and start.”

With that, Steve seemed satisfied with the Soldier’s admission of nerves as an explanation and leaned in, kissing him soundly. The Soldier had been braced for something of the sort, but not for the intensity, how he would be bowled over by Steve’s kiss enough that he’d need the hand that appeared at the dip of his spine to keep him standing. He gasped, which Steve took as a sign to lick into his mouth, stroking their tongues together.

The Soldier didn’t like being kept off-kilter. Steve kissed him again and again and he felt he was a moment away from toppling right the hell over, grasping at whatever part of Steve was within reach. But this was, apparently, what Steve had been looking for; the suave sweet-talker the Soldier had tried to become hadn’t been accurate to Steve's expectation. The stumbling, desperate creature trying to keep up with Steve’s kisses must have hit closer to the mark, because Steve started walking him backward toward the bedroom, unzipping the sweatshirt he’d lent the Soldier as they went. 

Steve’s hands on his skin scalded him. The Soldier tried to shy away, but he went cold as soon as they were separated more than an inch - and he’d spent enough time out of cryo to be disgusted by the chill again, even for a second. He pressed back into Steve’s touch and allowed himself to be stripped of the sweatshirt, the t-shirt under it, his own hands clumsy as they yanked Steve’s shirt up and off in return. He curled his trigger finger around a belt loop to tug him closer.

“Bossy,” Steve noticed, looking down at the Soldier’s hands as they snaked his belt free. “This part of that thing where you don’t let me spoon you anymore?”

“Pick up the pace if you don’t want me to take over,” the Soldier goaded, shoving a hand inside Steve’s pants as soon as he’d managed to undo his fly. Steve hissed, face screwing up, and the Soldier’s head swam when he could _feel_ him beginning to get hard in his grip.

Steve gave the Soldier a little shove toward the bed, so the Soldier toppled down onto the edge of it, tipping his head back to look up at Steve. He put his hands behind himself. Leaned back, cocking a brow as he let his legs just barely spread. “Well?” he said. “See something you like?”

Steve touched the Soldier’s face again, thumbing over his lower lip. The Soldier caught the tip of his thumb between his teeth and closed his lips around it.

“Shit,” Steve breathed. “Buck.”

The Soldier just let his eyes sink half-closed and sucked. Steve curled the rest of his fingers beneath his chin, keeping him looking up at him with his neck arched back, the Soldier’s own mismatched hands clawing into the sheets beneath them. Steve’s thumb tasted of faint salt and nothing. The weight of it pressing down on his tongue made him swallow convulsively. For a moment, the Soldier looked up at the man standing in front of him and saw a smaller figure, blond and brittle in the sunset; his vision flickered again when he blinked, showing him the full bulk of Captain America's real body.

Steve removed his thumb and replaced it with two fingers, which the Soldier gladly allowed to distract him. They were thick in his mouth. Not enough to make him gag, but Steve seemed to be testing it, waiting for the Soldier to swallow hard again until he retreated.

“This what you were after?” Steve asked as he took a moment to shuck his pants off.

The Soldier breathed raggedly, panting. He had not known enough of the variables to anticipate this outcome, or how it would affect him. “Yes,” he lied. His voice rasped over the word.

“Show me,” Steve said.

The Soldier didn’t have enough room to get to him properly while still on the bed, so he pushed Steve back half a step and fell off the mattress to hit the carpet with his knees. He was reaching for Steve before he’d even landed, although the sharp _thunk_ of his connection with the floor jarred all the way up his thighs while he leaned forward, taking the head of Steve’s cock into his mouth. It felt right to have the sharp shock of pain reverberate through him while he did this. The sting was enough to settle his bones. He dropped his jaw and took as much as he could, thinking of nothing but the sound Steve made when his cock nudged the back of the Soldier’s throat, hard and hot and present.

And he’d thought his mouth felt full with fingers. Steve got a fistful of dark hair at the back of the Soldier’s head and held on with a grip that somehow managed to be both firm and gentle, the Soldier looking up at him as he sucked, conscious of the way Steve’s gaze burned into him in return. He needed to make it look good. Needed to put on a show. But every time he leaned too far into his performance, Steve noticed he wasn’t behaving the way Bucky Barnes would behave. Better now to focus on pleasing him well enough to keep potential suspicion at bay.

He didn’t know why it bothered him so badly, that he was not gifted at behaving like Bucky Barnes. It dug claws into his heart.

“Look at you,” Steve whispered. The Soldier moaned when Steve pulled his hair, not realizing he’d closed his eyes until they fluttered open again. Steve shifted, rocking his hips with tiny, abortive little thrusts - the Soldier took the hint and moved quicker, bobbed his head, made a white-knuckled fist of his right hand not to gag when he went too far. “Shh, it’s okay,” Steve soothed, petting some more. “What’s the rush, huh? You in a hurry?”

The Soldier drew back to take a couple ragged breaths. “Yes,” he said.

Steve’s eyes were clear and focused as he scanned the Soldier’s face, trying to read him. “You want it that bad?”

The Soldier put his face to the crease of Steve’s hip so that whatever it was he was seeing was covered up. _“Yes.”_

“Okay,” Steve said. “Alright, Buck. I got you. I got you, open up.”

The Soldier let Steve draw his head back once more and opened his mouth. Steve guided his cock back inside, easy as that, and this time the Soldier didn’t even put up a pretense that he was in charge, letting Steve do what he wanted. Letting him hold him where he wanted. Letting him speak to him in a voice that made the Soldier’s head feel pleasantly blurred, whole body gone heavy and dumb like he was wading through honey, it was that slow and that sweet.

The only warning that Steve was close to climax was a sharp inhalation and a spasm of his hand at the base of the Soldier’s skull. Then he was coming, hot pulse of it on the Soldier’s tongue, the sound of his groan seared into the Soldier’s memory. He swallowed, throat working, but eventually he had to pull off with a wet, raw noise and catch his breath - although Steve didn’t let him recover long before he hauled him to his feet, guiding him back down onto the mattress. It was just as well that he helped. The Soldier’s legs were unsteady.

“You okay?” Steve asked, joining the Soldier on the bed. The pillow was very soft beneath the Soldier’s head, soft enough to be comparable to marshmallow, sinking all the way to the floor. “That looked intense.”

“Ain’t it always?” the Soldier replied as he turned his head to look at Steve. He was unsurprised to find his voice completely wrecked. “You’re the one who just came his brains out.”

“That’s a good point,” Steve said, thoughtful. He propped himself up on an elbow and smoothed his hand down the Soldier’s stomach, fingertips flirting with the waistband of the jeans he was still wearing. “I oughta even us out, yeah?”

The Soldier breathed shallowly, helpless to do anything but lift his hips so Steve could tug his pants down his legs and off the bed. His underwear was quick to follow, and he was alarmed to discover that he’d gotten hard without his own knowledge, dick curving up toward his stomach, purple-red at the head. The wetness that beaded up at the tip smeared his lower belly.

“You close already?” Steve asked. “God, I forgot how much you like doing that.”

The Soldier didn’t have an answer for him. His back arched when Steve wrapped a hand around him, and that part wasn’t for show at all, he was rapidly approaching his limit for stimuli - but if he appeared overwhelmed, Steve either didn’t notice or had decided to push through. The Soldier whimpered. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d tried to touch himself. It wasn’t like he’d had all that much time to rub one out between cryo sessions, and base camp wasn’t the sexiest place he could come up with.

Come to think of it, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d considered his body as a vehicle for pleasure at all. He’d forgotten he was even capable of it. He had a fully functional body, HYDRA would settle for nothing less, but at what point were weapons meant to orgasm?

“I got you,” Steve told him when the Soldier started making high, desperate noises in the back of his throat. “I got you, don’t worry.”

Perhaps unnerved by the bruised sounds the Soldier was making, Steve kissed him hard and stroked him off at the same time, his touch both familiar and sure. He touched the Soldier like a man confident in his abilities, and the Soldier watched his body respond in kind, the way a body would respond to a touch that had done this a thousand times before.

He felt nearly hysterical by the time he was close to coming. He bit Steve’s lower lip, writhed under him, hips shoving upward, although he wasn’t sure if he was trying to escape or prolong the pleasure. Nonetheless, his pleasure found him all the same, cresting over him in a wave that left him crying out against Steve’s mouth as he shuddered beneath him. 

“There you go,” Steve said. He was smiling. “That’s it.”

The Winter Soldier looked up at the ceiling. His world had shifted just an inch to the left, enough to expose a chink in his armor - all that was left was for him to notice that the light was getting in.

* * *

Although Steve was a light sleeper, the Soldier was careful and quiet enough to slip out of bed unnoticed. He disappeared down the hall to the guest room where he’d hidden all his weapons and took a circuit around the room, retrieving his guns, his knives, the damn arsenic capsules. He gathered them up and retreated to Steve’s bedroom once again, laying them out in a line on the bedside table.

He wanted to dress himself again in the clothes he’d arrived in, it only seemed fair, but he didn’t want to take Steve’s sweatshirt off in order to do it. It still smelled like him, soft against the Soldier’s skin, zipped up over all his scars. He sat on the edge of the bed and picked up the gun.

His orders were not to kill Captain America, but he knew that HYDRA would accept a clean kill over handing himself over willingly to the enemy, and those appeared to be the only options at the Soldier’s disposal. There would be no tactical retreat, no regroup, this would end here and now or it would not end at all. He considered the safety on the handgun. He touched it with the tip of his finger. In his mind’s eye, he saw blood flower through the bedclothes covering Steve’s body, a slick hot spill like any other Winter Soldier kill. He would get some on him in the process. The blood would smell of rust and it would clog the plates of his metal arm until it was diligently cleaned.

The Soldier put the gun down again, back on top of its holster. He knew he couldn’t do it. There was nothing more to do but wait for Steve to wake up.

The Soldier also knew it was a given fact that Steve would kill him when he found out that he’d been impersonating his beloved. This was the only viable scenario. And even if by some stroke of weakness Steve found himself unable to do away with a man wearing his dead love’s face, HYDRA would pull the trigger for him as soon the Soldier reported back again, just like the Soldier had always known they would, should he fail a mission.

A lock of hair lay across Steve’s forehead while he slept. The Soldier wanted to smooth it back, but he couldn’t bear to wake him. He didn’t have the stomach for it. He would let this moment spin out as long as it could, with the moonlight touching the arch of Steve’s cheekbone gently, giving him silvery gilt edges. _I kissed that mouth,_ the Soldier thought. He’d put his lips right where the light caught the corner of it and bloomed sterling.

However much time passed, the Soldier did not know. Moonlight faded and was replaced with the first glow of dawn, thawing out the image of Captain America in repose with sepia tones. The Soldier watched his eyelids flutter. What was he dreaming of? The crease between his brows made the Soldier think it was probably nothing nice, and he felt a sudden sharp cramp in his arm from how badly he wanted to wake him. 

_Someone should be here to drag him out of his nightmares,_ he thought. But the only one who was here was him.

By the time the clock read 6:30, the Winter Soldier was still sitting in the same position he’d been all evening. Steve began to stir, accustomed to a military early morning - he rubbed his eyes with a yawn, smiling as he turned his face toward the other side of the bed -

“Good morning, Captain,” the Soldier said. Steve’s smile faltered as soon as he saw the weapons cache on the bedside table.

“What the hell?” Steve rasped, voice sleep-rough and beginning to work its way toward panic. He shoved himself up to sitting, hair in disarray. “Don’t call me that, you know I hate it.”

“I don’t,” the Soldier told him. “Know, that is.”

Steve stared at him, eyes wild. “Fuck me,” he breathed. “Natasha was right.”

There was an ache welling up in the Soldier’s gut that wouldn’t ease. “Yes,” he said.

The anguish on Steve’s face shone as brilliantly as a double black eye for two seconds before he masked it and went impassive as the dead. “Why are you telling me this?” His eyes flicked toward the weapons before back again to the Soldier. “You just blew your own cover.”

“In six hours, HYDRA intends to stage a coup inside SHIELD,” the Soldier said, ignoring his question. “I am meant to be your distraction.”

“Six hours,” Steve repeated flatly.

“Yes,” the Soldier said. “You’ll need to dispose of me quickly. I’ve wasted most of your time already.”

“You - _what?”_ Steve made to reach for him, but aborted the gesture. “Buck - ”

“I’m not Bucky Barnes.” The Soldier stood, retrieving his gun and offering it to Steve grip-first with his own hand around the barrel. “I just got his face. Come on, Rogers. Do it fast. Find Romanoff.”

To his credit, Steve did take the gun. “This doesn’t make sense. Why are you helping me?”

The Soldier flinched. He shrugged, defensive, and shoved his hands inside the hoodie pockets as if that would make him any less dangerous than he was. “I don’t know.”

Steve’s eyes narrowed. “You’ve been guessing a lot,” he said, words coming slow and careful. “Which is why this whole thing has felt wrong. But you know things that HYDRA wouldn’t know.”

The Soldier wanted to squirm under the weight of that accusation, but he forced himself to stay still. “I was lying to you. I lied the whole time, stop trying to believe it.”

“HYDRA sent you here with orders to suck me off?” Steve demanded. “They told you to do that?”

The Soldier’s brow furrowed. “I - no, they - I was supposed to keep you occupied.”

“Well, you chose a helluva tactic,” Steve said dryly. He was still holding the gun. “Do you know me?”

“No,” the Soldier said. “I don’t. Pull the trigger, I coulda killed you.”

“What do you care? Means you did a good job with your mission,” Steve countered. “How did you know about us zipping our bedrolls together in France?”

The Soldier didn’t have an answer for him. His jaw worked around nothing, trying to speak.

“How’d they give you his face, pal?” Steve walked across the mattress on his knees toward him, moving as slowly as if he was approaching a cornered animal. “I’d know that face anywhere. You’re not just a dead ringer, and I don’t think they got that kind of tech.”

“Stay back,” the Soldier warned him, wavering. “I could hurt you.”

“I was sleeping a minute ago.” Steve put the gun down with finality. “If you were gonna hurt me, you would have already.”

“You got no idea what I woulda done,” the Soldier tried.

Steve reached out, fucking idiot, where was his sense of self-preservation? Bastard would probably get his arm bit off trying to pet a wolf. The Soldier snarled, baring his teeth, but Steve just put his hand at the base of his neck and squeezed, like he had nothing to be afraid of at all. “If you’re done faking it, why are you doing the accent again?” Steve asked gently.

The Soldier’s eyes went very wide. His eyelashes were wet against his cheek when he blinked. He hadn't noticed faint Brooklyn creeping back into his voice as the pressure around him rose, tongue curled around the syllables differently than before.

“Do you know me?” Steve asked again.

“I don’t know,” the Soldier answered, hoarse.

“You didn’t have to kiss me, y’know.” Steve’s smile was wry and crooked. “I was pretty distracted already.”

The Soldier looked at Steve’s lips, swallowing thickly. “I... yeah. I noticed.”

“Then why do it?”

“I wanted to,” the Soldier admitted. “I wanted to and I was afraid.”

“It was true, wasn’t it? Your story about falling from the train, being picked up by HYDRA afterward?” Steve’s hand had slipped inside the Soldier’s hood, thumb stroking rhythmic circles into his very top vertebra. “Nat could confirm that part of the story real well, it was the SHIELD stuff that didn’t make sense.”

“I,” the Soldier said. “I. I don’t.”

“I got you,” Steve said. “Hey. Hey, Buck. I got you. Come here.”

What could he do? The Soldier melted into Steve and allowed himself to be gathered in close, putting his head down on Steve’s shoulder. Those big arms swept him up, one hand cradled to the back of his skull, and it was just like their first hug in the hallway, except this time the Soldier meant it when he buried his face in Steve’s sleep shirt.

“Steve,” he whispered.

“You really thought I’d kill you?” Steve rubbed his back, up and down with brisk motions. “You thought there was a chance in hell I’d let you go like that?”

The Soldier nodded.

“Never,” Steve swore. “Never, cross my heart.”

“That don’t change the fact that you got - five hours and forty-five minutes left to save the world now,” the Soldier said, slightly muffled. “What’s your next play?”

“Well, first I gotta apologize to Natasha,” Steve said, and kissed the crown of the Soldier’s head. “Then I'm thinking maybe I’ll save the world.”

The Soldier made a harsh, desperate laugh into Steve’s shoulder. “Easy as that.”

“Considering I just turned a HYDRA operative with my dick? I’m feeling optimistic.” 

Steve was grinning when the Soldier whipped his head back to stare at him, slack-jawed. “Excuse me?” he exclaimed, bristling. “Is that what you think just happened?”

“Bucky,” Steve started.

“The fuck’s your problem, Rogers? I almost fucking - I could have _killed_ you! Is that funny?”

“Okay, okay, I know. Sorry,” Steve soothed, trying to pet the Soldier’s raised hackles back down. “I’m sorry. I can’t help it.”

“Where on earth is this good mood of yours coming from?” the Soldier demanded. “After all that!”

“I’m relieved,” Steve said. “This is relief.”

_“How?”_

Steve shrugged and gave a sad little twist of his mouth. “You finally sound like you.”

“Oh,” the Soldier said. His anger and disbelief deflated like a pricked balloon.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “You’re shit at undercover.”

The Soldier sat down heavily on the edge of the bed and grasped for Steve’s hand. He clasped it hard when Steve gave it to him. “What do I do?” he asked bleakly. “I didn’t think this far ahead.”

“Come with me,” Steve offered. He waited until the Soldier was looking at him to squeeze his hand, his expression as warm as a stained-glass prophet. “Help me take down the guys giving you orders.”

The Soldier’s tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. “You’d let me?”

“Hey, you’re the one with all the intel,” Steve pointed out. “I need you with me.”

There would be consequences to this decision, far-reaching consequences that he would not be able to anticipate. There would be blood, and terror, and a face-to-face confrontation with everything he’d known for the past century that would shatter his own foundation. The man sitting next to him could not save him from this, nor could he avoid it.

But the spot at Steve’s side that Steve offered him was irresistible, and the Soldier knew this as well. He wanted to be the man Steve thought he was. He wanted it so badly that it did not frighten him to think those words, _I want._

“Okay,” he said. “I will.” 

When Steve kissed him, a part of the Winter Soldier registered that there was no coming back from this.

However, it was Bucky Barnes who pressed forward and kissed him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: sex occurs when one participant is still in the midst of breaking through his brainwashing, and this could make the consent feel slightly dubious. If this is a premise that you are particularly sensitive to, I would definitely keep that in mind - but it's worth noting that the brainwashed party is the one who initiates everything, and no one is knowingly taking advantage of the other.
> 
> With regards to the kinky undertones, I'm more than happy to provide details to whatever degree of spoiler makes you most comfortable if you have questions <3
> 
> I'm transbucky on tumblr! Come say hi :)

**Author's Note:**

> Content warnings:
> 
> \- Occasional vivid description of past violence.  
> 


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